No other scientists were able to reproduce his results —
something that is vital in research. Most of Wakefield's
coauthors withdrew their support for the study. After conducting
an official inquiry, a tribunal of the British General Medical Council
concluded that Wakefield acted dishonestly and irresponsibly
and even performed unnecessary invasive medical procedures such
as colonoscopies on the children.

By then, however, the damage had already been done. Many people
in the US and Europe still believe that vaccinations cause
illnesses and conditions including autism in children. Despite
official medical advice that says vaccines are safe and vital,
many parents still worry about inoculating their children. The
belief is heavily ingrained in the minds of many.

Kennedy has pushed hard against the use of a chemical called
thimerosal — a preservative used in vaccines to prevent the
growth of bacteria and fungi that so-called antivaxxers often confuse with mercury. He
also thinks parents should choose whether their children are
vaccinated.

After a meeting at Trump Tower this month,
Kennedy said Trump had "some doubts about the current vaccine
policies and he has questions about it." He also said the
president had asked him to chair a commission on vaccination
safety, but Trump's team has since denied this.

Trump has previously used anecdotal examples to express his views
on the matter.

Healthy young child goes to doctor, gets pumped with massive shot of many vaccines, doesn't feel good and changes - AUTISM. Many such cases!

"I've seen people where they have a perfectly healthy child, and
they go for the vaccinations, and a month later the child is no
longer healthy," Trump said on Fox in 2012. "It happened to somebody
that worked for me recently. I mean, they had this beautiful
child, not a problem in the world. And all of a sudden, they go
in, they get this monster shot. You ever see the size of it? It's
like they're pumping in — you know, it's terrible, the amount.
And they pump this into this little body. And then all of the
sudden, the child is different a month later. And I strongly
believe that's it."

"People that work for me, just the other day, 2 years old,
beautiful child went to have the vaccine and came back and a week
later got a tremendous fever, got very, very sick, now is
autistic," he said.

Contrary to those statements, there is no epidemic. It is true there are more
cases; in the 1970s and 1980s, about one in 2,000 children
had autism, but today the CDC estimates that one in 150
8-year-olds in the US have it. But this is probably due to
better diagnosis rather than anything else. And Trump's opinions
of vaccines do not appear to be backed up by any sort of
scientific research. More recently he has claimed to support
vaccination but has argued that they should be given over an
extended period of time.

No more massive injections. Tiny children are not horses—one vaccine at a time, over time.

Infants' immune systems don't get "overloaded" by vaccines —
that's just not how it works. A single
bacterium has 2,000 to 6,000 immunological components, and we
encounter many bacteria every day. The total number of
immunological components of all 14 vaccines given in the first
years of life is about 160.

In fact, not getting vaccines on time can put children
at risk. Infants can be easily exposed to nasty diseases because
their immune systems are just getting started, and spreading
vaccines out delays their protection. It also exposes young
children to more visits to the doctor, potentially exposing them
to contagious diseases. Also, if there is a long time between
boosters, some parents forget to bring their children
back.